The disposal of municipal solid waste (MSW) and other waste has become a major issue over the past few decades due to space limitations for landfills and problems associated with siting new incinerators. In addition, increased environmental awareness has resulted in a major concern of many large metropolitan areas and to the country as a whole to ensure that the disposal of solid waste is properly handled. See e.g., USA EPA, The Solid Waste Dilemma: An Agenda for Action, EPA/530-SW-89-019, Washington, D.C. (1989).
Attempts have been made to reduce the volume and recover the energy content of MSW through incineration and cogeneration. The standard waste-to-energy incinerator will process the solid combustible fraction of the waste stream, produce steam to drive a steam turbine, and as a result of the combustion process produce a waste ash material. Typically, the ash is buried in a municipal landfill. Current trends and recent rulings, however, may require such material to be shipped to landfills permit for hazardous waste. This will substantially increase ash disposal costs. Moreover, there is increased public concern about gaseous emissions from landfills and the possibility of contamination of groundwater. Another disadvantage associated with incinerator systems is the production of large quantities of gaseous emissions resulting in the need for costly air pollution control systems in an attempt to decrease emission levels to comply with requirements imposed by regulatory agencies.
In order to overcome the shortcomings associated with incinerator systems, attempts have been made in the prior art to utilize arc plasma torches to destroy toxic wastes. The use of arc plasma torches provides an advantage over traditional incinerator or combustion processes under certain operating conditions because the volume of gaseous products formed from the plasma arc torch may be significantly less than the volume produced during typical incineration or combustion, fewer toxic materials are in the gaseous products, and under some circumstances the waste material can be glassified.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,280,757 to Carter et al. discloses the use of a plasma arc torch in a reactor vessel to gasify municipal solid waste. A product having a medium quality gas and a slag with a lower toxic element leachability is produced thereby.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,644,877 to Barton et al. relates to pyrolytic destruction of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) using a plasma arc torch. Waste materials are atomized and ionized by a plasma arc torch and are then cooled and recombined into gas and particulate matter in a reaction chamber. U.S. Pat. No. 4,431,612 to Bell et al. discusses a hollow graphite electrode transfer arc plasma furnace for treatment of hazardous wastes such as PCBs.
A process for remediation of lead-contaminated soil and waste battery material is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,284,503 to Bitler et al. A vitrified slag is formed from the soil. Combustible gas and volatized lead, which are formed from the waste battery casings, are preferably transferred to and used as a fuel for a conventional smelting furnace.
The systems proposed by Barton et al, Bell et al, Carter et al, and Bitler et al have significant disadvantages. For example, such disadvantages include insufficient heating, mixing and residence time to ensure high quality, nonleachable glass production for a wide range of waste feeds. Additionally, hearth size and feeder design are significantly limited since furnace walls must be relatively close to the arc plasma which is the only heat source. High thermal stress on the walls of the furnace often occurs as a result of the limitation on the hearth size.
Prior art arc plasma furnaces with metal electrodes further may be limited by short electrode lifetime when used at higher DC current. Therefore, to achieve higher power output, the arc potential must be raised by lengthening the arc. This results in radiative thermal losses to the furnace side walls and leads to metal electrode (torch) ineffectiveness. In addition, there are often difficulties associated with prior art transfer arc plasmas in start-up and restarting of such arc plasma systems when cold, nonelectrically conducting material is being processed.
Another disadvantage associated with prior art systems is the inefficient use of combustible gases produced during conversion of waste materials. For example, combustion of gases often does not result in a high conversion rate and is thus inefficient. In addition, the combustion of such gases frequently results in the emission of pollutants such as oxides of nitrogen (NO.sub.x) in amounts that render the process environmentally unattractive.
Thus, while such prior art attempts have been useful, there remains a need in the art for a robust, easy to operate waste conversion system which minimizes hazardous gaseous emissions and which maximizes conversion of a wide range of solid waste into useful energy and produces a product stream which is in a safe, stable form for commercial use or which does not require special hazardous waste considerations for disposal. It would therefore be desirable to provide a robust, user friendly and highly flexible method and apparatus for processing and converting a wide range of waste materials into useful energy and stable products while minimizing hazardous gaseous emissions, thereby overcoming the shortcomings associated with the prior art. It would also be desirable to provide robust, user friendly and highly flexible methods and apparatus for processing and converting a wide range of waste materials into useful gases for generating electricity in a manner that results in a high conversion rate and that significantly reduces emission of pollutants.